Well, no, good Rapaire. I understand your thespian impulses. I have trod the boards myself for a while and have no jealousy in me. I have had lines which, compared to your ruffian grunts, would sound like actual English!! Lines like "Where's your tobacco?" from All My Sons and "Whither goest thou, Everyman!??" from Everyman, a morality play, and even a whole song I sang solo from the stage of the Carnegie Junior Music Hall (which as you may know is right around the corner from NYC's Carnegie Hall) playing the deathless role of Tom Sawyer's brother Sid. But those days are long behind me, reduced to mere fodder in the splintering brilliance of blazing beingness as it Is Now. So I have no regrets for what Was Then; it all serves in our Quest for Perfection, a quest in which we are but humble vessels....

Judging from their mutual affection for very shaggy dogs, they may be the same person. If this proves so, Little Hawk will be very disappointed to learn that Rapaire has stolen a march on him this way, a sort of narcissistic four-flush with a padded deck, so to speak.

Bob Hill and his new wife Betty were vacationing in Europe... as it happens, near Transylvania . They were driving in a rental car along a rather deserted highway. It was late and raining very hard. Bob could barely see the road in front of the car. Suddenly the car skids out of control! Bob attempts to control the car, but to no avail! The car swerves and smashes into a tree.

Moments later, Bob shakes his head to clear the fog. Dazed, he looks over at the passenger seat and sees his wife unconscious, with her head bleeding! Despite the rain and unfamiliar countryside, Bob knows he has to get her medical assistance.

Bob carefully picks his wife up and begins trudging down the road. After a short while, he sees a light. He heads towards the light, which is coming from a large, old house. He approaches the door and knocks.

A minute passes. A small, hunched man opens the door. Bob immediately blurts, "Hello, my name is Bob Hill, and this is my wife Betty. We've been in a terrible accident, and my wife has been seriously hurt. Can I please use your phone?"

"I'm sorry," replied the hunchback, "but we don't have a phone. My master is a doctor; come in and I will get him!"

Bob brings his wife in.

An older man comes down the stairs. "I'm afraid my assistant may have misled you. I am not a medical doctor; I am a scientist.. However, it is many miles to the nearest clinic, and I have had a basic medical training. I will see what I can do. Igor, bring them down to the laboratory."

With that, Igor picks up Betty and carries her downstairs, with Bob following closely. Igor places Betty on a table in the lab. Bob collapses from exhaustion and his own injuries, so Igor places Bob on an adjoining table.

After a brief examination, Igor's master looks worried. "Things are serious, Igor. Prepare a transfusion." Igor and his master work feverishly, but to no avail. Bob and Betty Hill are no more.

The Hills' deaths upset Igor's master greatly. Wearily, he climbs the steps to his conservatory, which houses his grand piano. For it is here that he has always found solace. He begins to play, and a stirring, almost haunting melody fills the house.

Meanwhile, Igor is still in the lab tidying up. His eyes catch movement, and he notices the fingers on Betty's hand twitch, keeping time to the haunting piano music.. Stunned, he watches as Bob's arm begins to rise, marking the beat! He is further amazed as Betty and Bob both sit up straight!

Unable to contain himself, he dashes up the stairs to the conservatory.

It's gonna be curtains for you if you keep making a scene. I've flat out admitted before to having trod the boards, as my father did before me and my nephew has since. 'Shaw, it's in my blood -- the roar of the greasepaint, the smell of the groundlings. I'm a tough act to follow.

Nah, I was doing tech for the "progressive" community theater group, as opposed to the Little Theater group (which my father has played in) which was at the time doing either musicals or sugary awfuls. That's since changed -- my youngest brother played Willie Lohman a couple years ago, so they're doing serious stuff now as well as some fluff.

There was another scene where Lucy was seducing her fiance so he'd end up a vampire as well (or something)). Every night save the last they were kissing and carrying on, he was working her dress up, and after a 10-count entered her father and the vamp killer. On the last night the pause was a 25-count and the woman playing Lucy wasn't quite sure about how the scene was going to end up....

Nah, this was to highlight his entrance. You know: cape over his face in the bedroom window, and as he steps out of the window to bite Lucy Western in the neck he sweeps back the ol' cape? Well, there was so much smoke he entered fanning the cape so he could see.

I got all nostalgic and stuff, watching the lights. It reminded me of when I did theater tech. Once I nearly set Dracula on fire simply by using up the rest of the flash powder of the last night of the run.

In the catagory of Random (or not) Traces from All Over, I took African dance classes for several years, but long after the disco craze, to which I was completely oblivious.

Watching that clip, many of those moves have their genesis in West African dance, and while subtle, there is the hint of African polyrhythms in the disco beat. I don't know the history of the evolution of disco, and so don't know how the influence runs between disco and breakdancing. The influence of African music and dance in both is clear, regardless.

Now, having learned about the lives of stars, I'm headed back to Cosmos to be illuminated by the next episode.

Away across the quantum foam We wait for our dear sister to come home If the bosons and the leptons let her pass We'll see her safe on the Getaway grass. The Getaway is that kind of place, It grabs you by your mind, And takes you over major space In a minus sort of time. So save a song for us, Dear Jane, While pondering cosmic issues weighty, And we'll huzzah when we see you Safe back from 1980!

Running through CD's, YouTube, the DT, etc., hoping to feel inspired to learn a few new songs before the Getaway.

No sparks flying so far - at least not for anything I think I could do halfway well.

Having not owned a television for the better part of the past 40 years, I am pleased to have discovered that HULU has the entire Carl Sagan Cosmos series and think I will go watch another episode of that. Some would say I am 30 years behind the times. But Carl has convinced me that I am simply an old soul traveling at nearly the speed of light to reach 1980 just in time, as chance would have it, to watch this series and figure out how I got there.

Geez. I spent 45 minutes at work, 3.5 hours at a damn "economic symposium", 1.5 hours in physical therapy, and an hour at the VA Clinic. For lunch I got some whores de overs, and Amos had a luau. What the hell do you think you do...work at a library?

By the way, it was my own mistake to translate your prose as "lungfish". The translator had come up with "fish-breathing you are", which is pretty close to "fish-breath". I thought to myself, "No, he must have meant 'lungfish'."

So, you see, it's not the robot translator that is so stupid as you think. It's me! (grin) I do need the help of that clever translator, else I would be lost, mon ami. Lost! I am too clever for my own good.

I hereby rescind, deny, withdraw, nullify, cancel, obliterate, and erase all the mean things I have ever said about you. Your creative spirit is san pareil in the annals of pure malarkey and deserves applause and recognition, not sarcasm and condescension. Keep on flying, dude!